A simple line of thinking, towards living the best and most virtuous life:

Just get your ass outside!

Thinking heroes

The first thought is in regards to heroes; what would a hero do, what would a hero not do? 

First, no hero in their right mind would just stay at home.

Perhaps the primary issue we have at hand is that simply, we are wearing the wrong clothes. Clothing is akin to armor; I think myself I have made this mistake many many times.  I think the optimal is to consider this:

Better to over-pack, better to over-prepared, better to wear lots of layers, and simply take it off, when you get too hot.

Better to be over hot than under cold?

In regards to heat temperature and humidity; the funny thing is in the Iliad, weather climate is almost never mentioned. The only thing really mentioned is when the rosy morning wakes up, and then when the sun goes down, and then everyone retreats back to the camp, to feast.

Maybe this is what made the Mediterranean so ideal in terms of military combat and to conquest– it never really gets that hot, and also, it never gets that cold.

Living in Los Angeles, is often very confusing because it is very difficult to predict how to dress. Sometimes it is insanely cold, and then suddenly sometimes out of nowhere, the sun comes up.

Perhaps then, the ideal wardrobe is to just wear a lot of clothes and lots of layers, and when it gets too hot, just throw it back into your backpack. 

Visions

Lots of recent turbo thoughts: 

1. Bitcoin is a really big deal:

Honestly at this point, now that bitcoin has stabilized at around $70,000 a bitcoin, and it has been already around for over a decade, I’m pretty sure it’s here to stay. I was recently looking back at my accounting and finances, and I’m very happy that I first got into bitcoin at $7000 a coin, back in 2022. Honestly at this point, I consider it a very low risk investment, and it is only going to go uphill from here.

Also, bitcoin is the first native digital currency for the internet. I think the greatest innovation is thinking about the satoshi; the very very small fraction of a bitcoin, which can be used for micro, and also nano transactions. I’m actually currently formulating some ideas of creating the first bitcoin backed photography sharing platform; if you’re interested in collaborating shoot me an email at eric@erickim.com

2. Tech thoughts

Some technology thoughts I’ve been working through include the following:

First, the human joy and delight in the environment. I think all weightlifters, bodybuilders, photographers, human beings will benefit from nature, hiking, the mountains. I think one of the greatest blessings of living in Los Angeles is that there are lots of mountain hikes, so close by. Plus you got Malibu, the Pacific Palisades, and the Huntington library and botanical Gardens are just a stone throw away! 

First, I think there is a deep connection between men and the environment. For example, no one would want to be a trillionaire, if you were forced to live inside the hood, or worse, live in a parking lot garage for the rest of your life.

Still… it looks like we like greenery, blue skies, blue oceans, the sun!

ALO (air, land, ocean)

I think the reason why Los Angeles is so appealing to many is that in theory we have everything. The water, the ocean, the sky, the ideal climate.

Truth be told, it gets very dark and gloomy here and cold… but still, compared to the rest of the world, Los Angeles is paradise.

People complain about the traffic, but people often have the wrong analogy; the reason why it is so trafficky is that everyone wants to be here, because it is the best. Kind of like living in London, London traffic etc. 

I think the very very simple way to live virtuously in Los Angeles is to plan your life around traffic. The upside of being self-employed, just drive during off peak hours; and also, upside of being a weekend warrior, mixture you use the weekend to drive out further, to go exploring, go to hikes, etc.

3. Movie analogies for real life?

I finally watched Dune part II, and I loved it! Definitely top five new favorite movies of all time. The worm riding scene was phenomenal; Denis V is a genius!

Follow the director, not the actors nor the series.

I think what is so fascinating about Dune is the pseudo religiosity embedded within it. Notions of the Lisan-al-gaib, prophecies, etc.… the metaphors of Christianity, the prophet, the Messiah, Middle Eastern cultures etc. is really fascinating. 

First, let us consider Paul Atriedes. I’m quite certain that Paul was named after Saint Paul the apostle. Similar themes in the Matrix movie, NEO, the one, Trinity, the holy Trinity etc.… Lots of Christian, christianic themes here. 

Perhaps the reason why so many millennials and yuppies are so into these weird moon and horoscope stuff is that they’re lacking religion in their life. 

And perhaps, a sociological insight; maybe having some sort of religion in your life is critical, otherwise you fall victim to weird other consumerist religions, like the cult of Apple, the cult of Tesla Elon Musk and going to Mars, the cult of money, the cult of capital etc.

Let us consider even the ancient Greeks, religion or their notion of religion and the gods was a critical part of their being.

I suppose the nuance is that the way the ancient Greeks thought of religion and the gods was very very different than the modern Judeo Christian notion we have of religion. Perhaps I’m going to study a little bit more about ancient Greek notions of the gods etc.

4. Lowered cybertruck?

The other day, I saw a funny sight; somebody traded in a cybertruck at the Culver City Toyota dealership, and I was able to inspect it up close in real life.

The first thought I had was if you think about the roof line, the fastback design in the back, and overall proportions, it is almost like a modern day Lamborghini Countach, the ultimate wedge design. And then a funny thought; if you took a cybertruck, and you lowered it, and you slammed it, in theory it is the ultimate sportscar design. 

Anyways, still… the cybertruck is the best thing to have happened in car design perhaps the last hundred years. Even when I went to the Peterson automotive museum with Seneca, seeing an original Bugatti from the 1920s, in all black blew my mind. They were able to engineer phenomenal things over 100 years ago, why is it that all the modern car design is so lame? 

Anyways, if I were to get any modern day car, it would definitely be a cybertruck, maybe I would do a matte orange wrap on it. 

Also the good thing about the cyber truck, seeing it compared to all these other pick up trucks, it is actually not that big; I was a bit dubious, but I think it would be manageable to park in Los Angeles!

5. Other tech thoughts

So it looks like Apple Vision Pro, the initial enthusiasm and the novelty factor has died off. A bad sign; meeting some head directors of video game companies, they haven’t even bothered to try it out!

I think video games are a fascinating analogy for real life, because I think essentially… video games are a true metaphor for what we would really like to do in real life, our ideals.

For example, the new assassins Creed is out on iPad and iPhone Pro; I think in someways, people like the idea of becoming the assassin. To just explore the real city, to parkour around, to do real life world exploration.

Let us consider, if you were the assassin of assassin’s creed… Would you just be at home all day, watching Netflix, and staying inside your apartment? Probably not.

6. So What’s the point of life?

I think what a lot of people think is what is the point of life.

When you say point, the point of life… do you mean to say purpose, telos?

First, the reality is that you were born, you had a mother and father, you are alive. And ultimately it is up to you how you decide to direct your biological energy and power, to do what you desire to do.

The very very simple thought is the purpose of sex, sexual intercourse, men and women is to procreate and have children.

It seems that out of all this nonsense about gender and sex politics, nobody is talking about the kids! 

I think overall, modern day consumerism, nobody really wants to have kids anymore. They would just prefer to have dogs, travel to Japan, eat sushi or whatever. But I think this type of hedonistic living actually making people sad and miserable. People do not have purpose to living in life, and I think this is actually what gives people existential dread. Once you have a kid, life becomes very very straightforward and simple, and improved. There is no longer any sort of existential dread, raising your kid is the ultimate joy.

7. The ultimate tragedy?

I think the ultimate tragedy is when you have the elderly, older men, older women, without any kids, or with kids but no grandchildren… to me this is very sad.

For example, I think generally speaking, the notion of generational wealth, generational power, or to extend your power, across centuries, across generations… this is what people desire.

I think the reason why people invest in real estate property… Is that they want to build generational wealth.

“Generational wealth, that’s the key. I started off with shit so that shift started with me“– JAY Z

Why generational wealth?

Thinking centuries ahead is difficult; and also, a little bit novel in the sense that you think the question:

What’s the point of the purpose of building up wealth, for future generations, when you yourself cannot enjoy yourself?

For example, a lot of individuals live their lives, make money in order to spend it. They want to spend money, like buying a Lamborghini and giving themselves driving pleasure or whatever. Once again, much modern capitalism and consumerism is focused on hedonism:

The more money you make, the more money you spend on things, the more pleasure it will give you.

I think the reason why this line of thinking is a bit wrong is that if you think about your bodily synapses, there is a certain upper limit of hedonistic pleasure one can have. I think this is where people get into really weird drugs, in order to heighten their hedonistic pleasures.

In fact, pleasure is not the purpose of life. I think the purpose of life is to augment power, your power. How does one do this?

1. Having kids:

In the will to power, Nietzsche has this vision that in the future, families with multiple male children will be given benefits. I think the reason why so many men desire to have at least one son is that they want a new patriarch, a new king of the family to continue their lineage. I think a lot of people make the foolish optimization of earning a bunch of money, during their lifetime… but ultimately the best custodian of your economic power and wealth is your children, not some strangers or committee.

2. Physical, physiological power:

If you looked at all the marketing material for cars, objects and stuff… typically they tend towards the more muscular, the more aggressive, etc. For example, I think the reason why it is so fascinating to study the psychology of men who desire certain cars is that it shows the ideals they have for themselves. Example, people want to be louder, more aggressive, the appeal of loud exhaust or tailpipes. Or they want to feel more big and dominant, if you think about the lifted trucks, overlanding vehicles etc.

However, my personal thought and belief is that instead of wasting all that money in an external avatar which is your car, or vehicle… Don’t you recognize that your own human body is the ultimate vehicle? The ultimate thing to upgrade? 

The simple thought is if you want to expand your wingspan, your stance, your fenders, fender flares or whatever… just eat more meat, eat more steak, more beef, more dietary cholesterol, more organ meats, more beef liver etc.

In terms of height, unfortunately you cannot make yourself taller, but what you could do is stand more upright. For example, a 5 foot 5 man who stands upright, chest up actually looks more confident and dominating than a 6 foot 2 men, who is hunched over. therefore I suggest, the first thing you could do is fix your posture.

How do you fix your posture? I think it comes down to practice, and also maybe your shoes. Just buy some Vibram five finger shoes, and practice standing really upright, walk a lot, quite a lot of hiking, don’t use your phone.

Also, practice doing exercises which are about standing upright, and walking. For example, Farmer’s walks, deadlift walk, squat walk, yoke walk etc. Any sort of exercise which involves walking and standing upright is good.

3. Economic power & wealth

If I think about money, what exactly is money? It is your human labor, your physiological power embedded and imputed into a thing.

For example, the genius and brilliance of bitcoin is that there is so much energy and power imputed into a bitcoin.

People for a while was saying all this nonsensical stuff about bitcoin is bad for the planet blah blah blah, but what is really bad for the planet? Air conditioning, washing machines. The electricity output of air conditioning alone is at least 100,000 times worse than bitcoin production.

Also, most of the bad news about bitcoin mining was from mainland China, in which bitcoin miners, would use cheap coal to fuel bitcoin production, but the nuance is this–

Why do Americans care that mainland China was using coal to pollute her own environment?

For Americans who have never been to developing countries… We have never actually smelled or tasted pollution… You start to think and realize:

The upside of being an American is that all of your lovely iPhones are produced elsewhere, which pollutes a foreign country and a foreign place, while you yourself enjoy your beautiful devices and your clean air.

Even consider, really rich mainland Chinese families, none of them want to live in Beijing or Shanghai, even if they had all of the Rolls-Royce’s in the world. They all eventually buy a house in Vancouver somewhere with clean green air, and the aspire their children to start a life in America.  

I think the difficult thing is getting your wealth out of the country. For example, China, mainland China knows that the smart and rich mainland Chinese people want to take their wealth out of the country, and eventually go to America or somewhere else. Let us consider; that all the rich mainland Chinese people send their kids to study at American universities? The opposite does not happen; rich Americans do not send their kids to study Beijing or Shanghai, no. Rich mainland Chinese people want their kids to study at Harvard or Yale, maybe even UCLA.

---

Travel

I still haven’t come up with a good definition of traveling, maybe world exploration is a better analogy.

For example, if you thought about real life like a video game, Angkor Wat is such a fastening place. Angkor Wat is essentially the environment and landscape of tomb raider; even the locals in siem reap call the second temple “tomb raider”; I think they film the movie there. 

Anyways, something I’m very excited about is that next year, Cindy Seneca and I will be living in Cambodia for about six months; and I’m also doing an Angkor wat workshop there. 

Essentially I’m starting to become more and more interested in man-made environments, and having this question in my mind:

If your real life was a video game, a real world MMORPG, how would you live life? 

1. No car: no true epic video game warrior has a car. Maybe at best of horse, but even that is not necessary. If you are thinking about your life like Diablo, your main character, you just run around.
2. Character building? What then is the purpose or ethos of video games, RPGS, MMORPGS? The general idea is towards character building, leveling up, building up your statistics, your strength and your abilities, unlocking new armor weapons, engaging in even greater boss battles. Certainly much of real life is not like that, so then I suppose a bit question at hand is how can you transform your real life to mimic that of a video game?

---

ERIC KIM CAMBODIA ANGKOR WAT TRAVEL PHOTOGRAPHY EXPERIENCE 2025

Adventure beckons you:

ERIC KIM TRAVEL PHOTOGRAPHY ANGKOR WAT WORKSHOP EXPERIENCE (April 24-27th, 2025)

If you desire new frontiers, new adventures, a new you — this experience is for you.

ERIC KIM WORKSHOPS >

---

Assignments

1. Upload your best photos to arsbeta.com
2. Make your own photo blog (bluehost.com) and install WordPress.org
3. Buy 60 pound weight vest on Titan.fitness, and go on a long hike with it
4. LUMIX S9 looks cool — get it with the new pancake f8 lens?

Films

1. DUNE II– watch the extras, buy it in iTunes Tv store.
2. Cinema BY KIM

---

Now what?

Start your own blog, email newsletter ,,, and start publishing the future!

What to study?

Michael Saylor— his website url is brilliant (Michael.com)

Also Bitcoin — hope.com

I’m literally watching all Michael Saylor interviews and podcasts, the man is a genius!

---

Forward the money

Feeling fire? Forward the turbo!

EK NEWSLETTER

---

Beginners mind is best

START HERE, BOOKS

---

He who owns the spice (Bitcoin) shall own the universe

ERIC KIM BLOG

---

A simple line of thinking, towards living the best and most virtuous life:

Just get your ass outside!

Thinking heroes

The first thought is in regards to heroes; what would a hero do, what would a hero not do? 

First, no hero in their right mind would just stay at home.

Perhaps the primary issue we have at hand is that simply, we are wearing the wrong clothes. Clothing is akin to armor; I think myself I have made this mistake many many times.  I think the optimal is to consider this:

Gutter to overpack, better to overprepared, better to wear lots of layers, and simply take it off, when you get too hot. 

Better to be over hot than under cold?

In regards to heat temperature and humidity; the funny thing is in the Eliott, weather climate is almost never mentioned. The only thing really mentioned is when the Rosie warning wakes up, and then when the sun goes down, and then everyone retreats back to the camp, to feast.

Maybe this is what made the Mediterranean so ideal in terms of military combat and conquest conquest– it never really gets that hot, and also, it never gets that cold. 

Living in Los Angeles, is often very confusing because it is very difficult to predict how to dress. Sometimes it is insanely cold, and then suddenly sometimes out of nowhere, the sun comes up.

Perhaps then, the ideal wardrobe is to just wear a lot of clothes and lots of layers, and when it gets too hot, just throw it back into your backpack. 

Visions

Lots of recent turbo thoughts: 

1. Bitcoin is a really big deal:

Honestly at this point, now that bitcoin has stabilized that around $70,000 of bitcoin, and it has been already around for over a decade, I’m pretty sure it’s here to stay. I was recently looking back at my accounting and finances, and I’m very happy that I first got into bitcoin at $7000 a coin, back in 2022. Honestly at this point, I consider it a very low risk investment, and it is only going to go uphill from here.

Also, bitcoin is the first native digital currency for the Internet. I think the greatest innovation is thinking about the Satoshi; the very very small fraction of a bitcoin, which can be used for micro, and also nano transactions. I’m actually currently formulating some ideas of creating the first bitcoin backed photography sharing platform; if you’re interested in collaborating shoot me an email at eric@erickim.com

2. Tech thoughts

Some technology thoughts I’ve been working through include the following:

First, the human joy and delight in the environment. I think all weightlifter, bodybuilders, photographers, human beings will benefit from nature, hiking, the mountains. I think one of the greatest blessings of living in Los Angeles is that there are lots of mountain hikes, so close by. Plus you got Malibu, the Pacific Palisades, and the Huntington library and botanical Gardens are just a stone throw away! 

First, I think there is a deep connection between men and the environment. For example, no one would want to be a trillionaire, if you were forced to live inside the hood, or worse, live in a parking lot garage for the rest of your life.

Still… It looks like we like greenery, blue skies, blue oceans, the sun!

I think the reason why Los Angeles is so appealing to many is that in theory we have everything. The water, the ocean, the sky, the ideal climate.

Truth be told, it gets very dark and gloomy here and cold… But still, compared to the rest of the world, Los Angeles is Paradise.

People complain about the traffic, but people often have the wrong analogy; the reason why it is so trafficky is that everyone wants to be here, because it is the best. Kind of like living in London, London traffic etc. 

I think the very very simple way to live virtuously in Los Angeles is to plan your life around traffic. The upside of being self-employed, just drive during off peak hours; and also, upside of being a weekend warrior, mixture you use the weekend to drive out further, to go exploring, go to hikes, etc. 

3. Movie analogies for real life?

I finally watched Dune part two, and I loved it! Definitely top five new favorite movies of all time. The worm riding scene was phenomenal; Denis V is a genius!

Follow the director, not the actors nor the series.

I think what is so fascinating about Dune is the pseudo religiosity embedded within it. Notions of the Lisan-al-gaib, prophecies, etc.… The metaphors of Christianity, theprophet, the Messiah, Middle Eastern cultures etc. is really fascinating. 

First, let us consider Paul at treaties. I’m quite certain that Paul was named after Saint Paul the apostle.  similar themes in the matrix movie, Neil, the one, Trinity, the holy Trinity etc.… Lots of Christian, christianic themes here. 

Perhaps the reason why so many millennials and yuppies are so into these weird moon and horoscope stuff is that they’re lacking religion in their life. 

And perhaps, a social logical inside; maybe having some sort of religion in your life is critical, otherwise you fall victim to weird other consumers religions, like the cult of Apple, the cult of Tesla Elon Musk and going to Mars, the cult of money, the cult of Capital etc.

Let us consider even the ancient Greeks, religion or their notion of religion and the gods was a critical part of their being.

I suppose the new ones here is eon, at least the way the ancient Greeks thought of it was very very different than the modern Judeo Christian notion we have of religion. Perhaps I’m going to study a little bit more about ancient Greek notions of the gods etc.

4. Lowered cybertruck?

The other day, I saw a funny sight; somebody traded in a cyber truck at the Culver City Toyota dealership, and I was able to inspect it up close in real life.

The first thought I had was if you think about the roof line, the fastback design in the back, and overall proportions, it is almost like a modern day Lamborghini Countach, the ultimate wedge design. And then a funny thought; if you took a cyber truck, and you lowered it, and you slammed it, in theory it is the ultimate sportscar design. 

Anyways, still… The cyber truck is the best thing to have happened in car design perhaps the last hundred years. Even when I went to the Peterson automotive museum with Seneca, seeing an original Bugatti from the 1920s, in all black blew my mind. They were able to engineer Phenomenal things over 100 years ago, why is it that all the modern car design is so lame? 

Anyways, if I were to get any modern day car, it would definitely be a cybertruck, maybe I would do a matte orange wrap on it. 

Also the good thing about the cyber truck, seeing it compared to all these other pick up trucks, it is actually not that big; I was a bit dubious, but I think it would be manageable to park in Los Angeles!

5. Other tech thoughts

So it looks like Apple Vision Pro, the initial enthusiasm in the novel T factor has died off. a towing sign; meeting some head directors of video game companies, they haven’t even bothered to try it out!

I think video games are a fascinating analogy for real life, because I think essentially… Video games are a true metaphor for what we would really like to do in real life, our ideals.

For example, the new assassins Creed is out on iPad and iPhone Pro; I think in someways, people like the idea of becoming the assassin. To just explore the real city, to parkour around, to do real life world exploration.

Let us consider, if you were the assassin of assassin’s creed… Would you just be at home all day, watching Netflix, and staying inside your apartment? Probably not.

6. So What’s the point of life?

I think what a lot of people think is what is the point of life.

When you say point, the point of life… do you mean to say purpose, telos?

First, the reality is that you were born, you had a mother and father, you are alive. And ultimately it is up to you how you decide to direct your biological energy and power, to do what you desire to do.

The very very simple thought is the purpose of sex, sexual intercourse, men and women is to procreate and have children.

It seems that out of all this nonsense about gender and sex politics, nobody is talking about the kids! 

I think overall, modern day consumerism, nobody really wants to have kids anymore. They would just prefer to have dogs, travel to Japan, eat sushi or whatever. But I think this type of hedonistic living actually making people sad and miserable. People do not have Purpose to living in life, and I think this is actually what gives people existential dread. Once you have a kid, life becomes very very straightforward and simple, and improved. There is no longer any sort of existential dread, raising your kid is the ultimate joy.

7. The ultimate tragedy?

I think the ultimate tragedy is when you have the elderly, older men, older women, without any kids, or with kids but no grandchildren… To me this is very sad.

 for example, I think generally speaking, the notion of generational wealth, generational power, or to extend your project, across centuries, across generations… This is what people desire.

I think the reason why people invest in real estate property… Is that they want to build generational wealth.

“Generational wealth, that’s the key. I started off with shit so that shift started with me“– JAY Z

Why generational wealth?

Thinking centuries ahead is difficult; and also, a little bit novel in the sense that you think the question:

what’s the point of the purpose of building up wealth, for future generations, when you yourself cannot enjoy yourself?

For example, a lot of individuals live their lives, make money in order to spend it. They want to spend money, like buying a Lamborghini and giving themselves driving pleasure or whatever. Once again, much modern capitalism and consumerism is focused on hedonism:

The more money you make, the more money you spend on things, the more pleasure it will give you.

I think the reason why this line of thinking is a bit wrong is that if you think about your bodily synopsis, there is a certain upper limit of hedonistic pleasure one can have. I think this is where people get into really weird drugs, in order to heighten their hedonistic pleasures.

In fact, pleasure is not the purpose of life. I think the purpose of life is to augment power, your power. How does one do this?

1. Having kids:

In the will to power, Nietzsche has this vision that in the future, families with multiple male children will be given benefits. I think the reason why so many men desire to have at least one son is that they want a new patriarch, a new king of the family to continue their lineage. I think a lot of people make the foolish optimization of earning a bunch of money, during their lifetime… But ultimately the best custodian of your economic power and wealth is your children, not some strangers or committee.

2. Physical, physiological power:

If you looked at all the marketing material for cars, objects and stuff… Typically they tend towards the more muscular, the more aggressive, etc. For example, I think the reason why it is so fascinating to study the psychology of men who desire certain cars is that it shows the ideals they have for themselves. Example, people want to be louder, more aggressive, the appeal of loud exhaust or tailpipes. Or they want to feel more big and dominant, if you think about the lifted trucks, over landing vehicles etc.

However, my personal thought and belief is that instead of wasting all that money in an external avatar which is your car, or vehicle… Don’t you recognize that your own human body is the ultimate vehicle? The ultimate thing to Upgrade? 
Simple thoughts is if you want to expand your wingspan, your stance, your fenders, fender flares or whatever… Just eat more meat, eat more steak, more beef, more dietary cholesterol, more organ meats, more beef liver etc.

In terms of height, unfortunately you cannot make yourself taller, but what you could do is stand more upright. For example, a 5 foot five man who stands upright, chest up actually looks more confident and dominating than a 6 foot two men, who is hunched over. therefore I suggest, the first thing you could do is fix your posture.

How do you fix your posture? I think it comes down to practice, and also maybe your shoes. Just buy some Vroom five finger shoes, and practice standing really upright, walk a lot, quite a lot of bikes, don’t use your phone.

Also, practice doing exercises which are about standing upright, and walking. For example, Farmer’s walks, dead lift walk, squat walk, yoke walk etc. Any sort of exercise which involves walking and standing upright is good.

3. Economic power & wealth

If I think about money, what exactly is money? It is your human labor, your physiological power embedded and imputed into a thing.

For example, the genius and brilliance of bitcoin is that there is so much energy and power imputed into a bitcoin.

People for a while was saying all this nonsensical stuff about bitcoin is bad for the planet blah blah blah, but what is really bad for the planet? Air conditioning, washing machines. The electricity output of air conditioning alone is at least 100,000 times worse than bitcoin production.

Also, most of the bad news about bitcoin mining was from mainland China, in which bitcoin miners, would use cheap coal to fuel bitcoin production, but the nuance is this–

Why do Americans care that mainland China was using coal to pollute her and environment?

For Americans who have never been to developing countries… We have never actually smelled or tasted pollution… You start to think and realize:

The upside of being an American is that all of your lovely iPhones are produced elsewhere, which pollutes a foreign country and a foreign place, while you yourself enjoy your beautiful devices and your clean air.

Even consider, really rich mainland Chinese families, none of them want to live in Beijing or Shanghai, even if they had all of the Rolls-Royce’s in the world. They all eventually buy a house in Vancouver somewhere with clean green air, and the aspire their children to start a life in America.  

I think the difficult thing is getting your wealth out of the country. For example, China, mainland China knows that the smart and rich mainland Chinese people want to take their wealth out of the country, and eventually go to America or somewhere else. Let us consider; that all the rich men land Chinese people send their kids to study at American universities? The opposite does not happen; rich Americans do not send their kids to study Beijing or Shanghai, no. Rich mainland Chinese people want their kids to study at Harvard or Yale, maybe even UCLA.

---

Travel

I still haven’t come up with a good definition of traveling, maybe world exploration is a better analogy.

For example, if you thought about real life like a video game, encore what is such a fastening place. Angkor Wat is essentially the environment and landscape of tomb raider; even the locals in siem reap call the second temple “tomb raider”; I think they film the movie there. 

Anyways, something I’m very excited about is that next year, Cindy Seneca and I will be living in Cambodia for about six months; and I’m also doing an Angkor wat workshop there. 

Essentially I’m starting to become more and more interested in man-made environments, and having this question in my mind:

If your real life was a video game, a real world MMORPG, how would you live life? 

1. No car: no true epic video game warrior has a car. Maybe at best of horse, but even that is not necessary. If you are thinking about your life like Diablo, your main character, you just run around.
2. Character building? What then is the purpose or ethos of the game, the video game etc.? The general idea is towards character building, leveling up, building up your statistics, your strength and your abilities, unlocking new armor weapons, engaging in even greater boss battles. Certainly much of real life is not like that, so then I suppose a bit question at hand is how can you transform your real life to mimic that of a video game?

---

Never stop upgrading.

Maybe a simple and straightforward way we could think about life isn’t in regards to upgrading. For example, considering things which are being upgraded, things which can keep continually being upgraded, things which cannot.

The double sided twist; sometimes, it is better if something cannot be upgraded, other times it is better when you know things can be upgraded.

For example, in the context of photography and digital photography, the really really big issue here is that with any sort of digital camera, you cannot upgrade the body or sensor. You have to trade in or sell your old one, to buy the new one.

ChatGPT 

ChatGPT 4o is now out,  and I think what is really incredible about ChatGPT as a technology or a software or a thing is that as time goes on, it will keep getting upgraded, keep getting better.

In the context of vehicles, Tesla is the killer vehicle, because the software and the auto pilot technology is always improving over time. 

Even the WordPress theme I’m using, or a lot of them; get regular updates overtime, and if you just have the auto updates enabled, you can sleep with the joy knowing that as you sleep, it will just keep getting upgraded!

Upgrading materials

After experimenting with a lot of polyester, synthetic materials, much of the stuff from Lululemon etc., attended the day, the materials suck.  Half of the performance clothing items I purchased from them have frayed, broken, fallen into disarray. And ultimately, what sucks about Lululemon, or any sort of man-made synthetic materials is that ultimately none of it is breathable, and not very good at thermal regulation. It is either too hot or too cold, never in between.

I suppose this is where animal fibers like merino wool is so good; even this random minus 33 brand merino wool T-shirt that I bought from Amazon mini years ago, is still insanely durable, and works great! Even with my 60 pound weight vest on. 

A nuance; I have about half a dozen outlier.NYC ultrafine merino wool T-shirts, but overtime, they have all shredded, they have poor durability.

Does durability matter?

In terms of the ultimate sustainability model, the best computers, tablets, technology, laptops, phones or whatever, in theory you could just swap out the processor, and slap in a new one, or upgrade the ram whenever you want to.

For example, I’m blessed to have been born in 1988, and was part of the original hacker ethos, building my own computers, overclocking them, etc. This was great, because there was a strong sense of possibility; as a sophomore in high school, certainly I could not afford the most expensive Intel processors, so I had to stick with AMD. Also, I cannot afford the best GeForce graphics cards, so I had to opt for lower and ones, which meant that I had far less frames per second than my friends.

Also with monitors, the monitor technology at the time was not great, but there was a promise that overtime, you could upgrade and swap out your monitor.

I think the tragedy of Apple is that a lot of our lovely laptops and devices are made obsolete. For example, my 2017 MacBook Pro, which I purchased for about $2000 maxed out, from the refurbished Apple Store online, and now, it is practically unusable. The battery lasted about two minutes, and it is slower than even my $300 iPhone SE.

Strategies?

When I was the UCLA undergraduate, my boss, the IT Director of UCLA undergraduate admissions, John Talbert, had this very interesting ethos he taught me:

When you have to buy new computers for the department, always buy the most expensive top-of-the-line ones, even though upfront is more expensive, it will last a lot longer before you have to upgrade and replace them all.

What some departments do is that they just buy the cheapest computers, and soon it gets outdated, and there is an insane amount of work that has to be done to swap it all out.

Thinking more long term?

Not always, but often buying the top-of-the-line stuff, when it is logical, makes sense.

For example, my beloved Texas power squat bar; I think it has a strength of about 10,000 pounds, which means I am sure that it could probably hold about 5000 pounds, and not break.

Also, I got these really great weightlifting plates on extreme sale from habitats for humanity, these “iron grip” brand weightlifting plates, which will never go out of fashion, because iron, heavy stuff, or last practically forever for weightlifting. I have about 14 of them, which means seven plates on each side.

Steel?

Probably one of the most interesting material science thoughts I’ve learned is from Michael Saylor, thinking about steel. I never had any idea that steel was such an amazing innovation. Same goes with stainless steel, aluminum, even to some extent iron.

Cameras

Even within a short time, I have seen so many digital like a cameras come and go, and if you observe it, the shelflife of all of them is quite poor. As of now we are already on the M11, so quickly. The M8, M8.2, M9, M, M10, M-10R now M11. Not to mention all these other random like a rangefinder cameras in between.

Also, other digital cameras like the Leica Q, Leica Q2, now Leica Q3.

Fujifilm is kind of insane, starting from the original X100, X 100 S, 100 T, X 100 F, X 100 V, and now X100 VI.  Also same thing goes with all their XT-series cameras. Same goes with Sony Panasonic etc.

So what should we do?

If you are committed to using non-interchangeable lens system, know that pest, he might only get two or three years out of it. This is the trade-off; you sacrifice long-term durability for short term benefits.

For example, my beloved Rico GR digital cameras; because I am such an insane hard-core user, most of my cameras have lasted me about a year and a half, two years tops. I just have to keep buying them, they keep on breaking.

So theory is the lens is something that doesn’t need upgrading, never changes. For example, I have a Leica 35mm f2 Summicron ASPH lens, which in theory will never need any upgrading. It will work just fine even once Seneca is 36 years old.

Also I suppose the upside of film cameras is that they don’t really need any upgrading either. For example, my film Leica MP camera will last indefinitely, I’m sure even Seneca’s grandson could use it.

But the problem about film cameras is the insane inconvenience of it; maybe somebody will make the process easier one day, but until then, digital photography is at least 100,000 times better.

Dated or outdated?

I think one thing which really fascinates me about the cyber truck, is that in theory, the stainless steel body should last practically forever. Because it does not require any sort of paint, you never have to worry about paint peeling or chipping off in the future.

This happened a lot in the 80s and 90s; these old Nissan cars, Honda cars, Toyota cars with peeling clear coat paint, peeling black paint etc. No car from the 80s or 90s has lasted until now in terms of the original paint.

Today, all of these people who going over all black everything cars; I doubt any sort of car with any sort of black paint will last in the relentless Southern California sun.

Clothes

I think the particle and the pragmatic benefit or the upside or the theory or philosophy behind all black everything clothing is that black clothing will never go out of style. Even the funny upside is faded black clothes also looks stylish.

So then I suppose the optimization is this:

When you have to buy clothes, buy the highest quality fabric all black everything clothing, in the hopes of using it or wearing it forever.

Certainly nothing is meant to last forever, but there are certain things last longer than others.

Leather, I still think leather is very underappreciated. Your black leather jacket will never go out of style. This seems to be a good idea.

Cotton denim is fine, but even that has a certain shelf life. I think currently for pants, the best solution I’ve discovered is the Lululemon license to train shorts, apparently they also make pants too. 

I wore merino wool leggings for a long time, but no matter what, it seems that it doesn’t last forever. Sooner or later holes and emerge around the knees, and then eventually it just falls to shreds. 

I suppose the upside of living in Southern California or LA is that you could just wear shorts all year round!

So maybe just a practical thought is just buy some really really good high-quality shorts. Currently the best shorts are the Lululemon license to train ones, I like the 5 inch one.

“Investing?”

When people tell you that something is a good investment, it probably isn’t.

For example, often when people tell you that something is a good investment, they either are misinformed, lack critical thinking, etc.

In theory, nothing is really that good of an investment,  consider almost all of the modern day things which exist:

1. All Internet connected things, well sooner or later get outdated.
2. Your car, no matter how good, is robust at best. If you have a gas or hybrid car, you will always need oil changes, sooner or later something will break. Even if you have an electric car, the battery will slowly lose its capacity overtime.
3. Fiat currency, US dollars in your checking or savings account, is slowly bleeding value 7 to 12% a year because of inflation. And because of the expanding money supply.
4. Homes are slowly decaying overtime, even if you own a nice single-family home, sooner or later you’re going to have to tear it down and build a new one. Or upgrade the appliances, sooner or later all the appliances will break.

What goes up in value over time?

1. Real estate in a good location is good, if you just think about the asphalt or the concrete or the granite on the bottom of it, purely for location. However the subtle nuance of property, is property taxes, insurance, maintenance fees. I think any property requires at least a general 1% maintenance fee. And you still have to charge your property, maintain it, property taxes might go up etc. And even if your property value goes up overtime, you have to beat inflation, so the only real intelligent way to get into real estate is purchase real estate in an insanely great area or neighborhood, in which the value of the home or the property or the land Will outpace of inflation.
2. Bitcoin: each and every day, the total market cap is expanding. Even just a few years ago, the total market cap was only 500 billion, now it is over 1.2, 1.3 trillion. Soon it will be 10 trillion, 100,000,000,000,000, 1000 trillion and beyond. And the more people who adopted, the stronger the network gets, kind of like social media; Facebook only became valuable as more people got onto Facebook. Or iPhone iOS; having FaceTime becomes more useful as all your friends and family members get iPhones with FaceTime.
3. Your popularity, you’re a claim: the more you publish, the more you share your thoughts, the better. Fame is like a fire that cannot die; the more you fainted, the bigger it becomes. Even bad news, all news is good news, For fame. Consider Donald Trump; the more media attention he gets, the more people criticize him, the more popular famous and powerful he becomes. If you are really anti-Donald Trump, just don’t talk about him at all. Even when you randomly criticize or critique something he said amongst friends or over dinner, you’re augmenting his fame. The best way to kill people is to not talk about them.

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Matte black yourself?

Assuming that muscle is the ultimate accessory, instead of Matt blacking your car, or met blocking your home, Matt black yourself, your body.

Also, people always seem to be impressed with my full body tan. Having a full body tan is certainly a signal of wealth in today’s world. Especially when most people are just like the people, working indoors all day.

So maybe when you get a full body tan, just put on lots of sunblock if you’re worried about getting sunburnt, by getting a tan, in theory you’re matte blacking your body. 

Also, I think the reason why having a tan, a full body tan is so fascinating is because it is like stored energy or power, manifested through your skin. Your skin, your body is the ultimate fashion accessory; invest your body over everything else. Your body is something that is the most critical thing, in which you should invest all your attention energy and resources towards. 

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How to upgrade your body?

The first very simple thought is ensure that you sleep insanely well.

How to do this? First, the night prayer, eat 5 pounds of beef or red meat.

I like Lam, but maybe at this point Lam is more of an exotic novelties; if you live in the states, beef is much more readily available.

The simplest beef — bang for the buck is 80/20 ground beef. Another very good option is the 7030 Wagyu ground beef at Costco, insanely good. For grass fed ground beef, the frozen 100% grass fed burger patties in the Costco freezer aisle.

I’ve been making beef chili lately with ground beef, very easy. Just stirfry all of the ground beef, for 5 pounds in a very big pot, cook it thoroughly, drain the fudge, then at spices of your choice, a little bit of tomato paste, soy sauce, fish sauce, And you’re good!

Last night I ate about 4 pounds of it, still left me a bit hungry. I could probably eat about 5 pounds now.

Weightlifting

Sometimes people are confused why I am so into weightlifting, bodybuilding, flexing my muscles or whatever; my general thought is that your body is the most most virtuous thing of all. Why? Your body doesn’t lie, your body is tied to physics, reality.

Assume you don’t take steroids, you cannot cheat your body. If you maintain a low body fat percentage, high muscle mass, without steroids or other weird testosterone boosting stuff, just eating meat, or meat whatever… It is a signal that whatever you’re doing is working.

I think first of all, the simplest thing that can invest in is weightlifting equipment, that you could just do by yourself at home, in your apartment, your parking lot, your parking spot in the back of your apartment, whatever is convenient.

I love the gym, but if you live somewhere in which the traffic is unbearable, it’s like Los Angeles, building your own home gym is the way.

Suggestions

A very simple idea; for a lot of people who are wasting money on clothes, cars, homes etc.… The best fashion to have, to fashion yourself is your muscles, your body.

Conspiracy theories screaming illuminati, they cannot imagine this much power and muscle inside a human body – he 6 2 how he fit inside a new Bugatti? Ha ha you got me (JAY Z)

Economic problems

So in theory, any skinny fat loser could purchase a Bugatti, a Lamborghini, McLaren, whatever. And in theory, any man can simply push his foot against the pedal, and it will make loud sounds, and go fast.

However, what most men cannot do is at the gym, or even in public, scream really loud, a primal roar, and, lift at least seven, eight, nine, 10 plates and beyond.

Risk of injury?

I think people missed the point; people always say, “Be careful“– when they see me stack up the bar with over 10 plates.

This is precisely the idea; it is actually the risk of injury which makes one create courageous and brave. If you knew with 100% certainty before you would lift an astronomical amount of weight; it wouldn’t really mean anything.

Skin, muscle in the game, your body in the game. I think also why war, hand to hand combat is so noble is that you’re putting your own life, your own body, your own soul on the line. If you do something, without any potential risk to damaging or hurting or harming your human body, it is not real courage.

For example, thinking about the Iliad; I think the proper way to consider things is that you can only trust somebody who actually looks like a Achilles to translate the thing. You cannot have old flabby skinny fat guys translating heroism; they will never understand. 

This is also why I find it extremely bizarre when women write or opine on manliness or masculinity; if as a woman you have never experienced testosterone, or if you do not have testicles… Or testes, you will never understand the physiological effects of being a man. Similarly speaking a man who never has to go through a menstrual cycle; he will also never understand the plight of women. Same goes with childbirth.

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How to feel insanely good?

Waking up today, after sleeping like a person, feeling like $1 trillion; what is the idea?

First, the night prior; eating insanely well. 2 pounds of brisket, maybe 3 pounds of ground beef? 8020.

Sleeping very deeply, very long. Maybe sleeping 10 hours?

1. Currently, it seems that the optimal strategy to coffee and caffeine is just drink a lot first thing waking up, very very strong. Like a one rep Max coffee attempt. But then at the end of the day, after the morning, 100% abstinence. I think if we consider that sleeping well for the gods, then actually sleeping well might be the number one most critical thing to optimize. If this is the case, one should not have any caffeine after 8 AM?
2. Eating enough, eating well: I’m starting to think that 99.9% of the issues of modern day life, modern day humans and physiology has to deal with nutrition. Even Nietzsche said that the great men of the future would become more carnivorous. The more carnivorous become, the more powerful you become. Certainly you could survive on other things; but what would you prefer to be; Hercules, or serf? Or would you rather be a drone or an Archon?

Money thinking

One of the ironies in the western world, America is that people want to make a bunch of money in order to spend it, and in order to purchase and things. But what if, the goal was actually to stack and conserve your money —

I bought every V 12 engine, wish I could take it back to the beginning – JAY Z

I thought about this line from Jay Z a lot; it could be interpreted in two ways:

1. First, ideas that when you’re starting off, the beginning, when you’re hungry and poor and striving, this is the best position to be in. Because once you’re already successful, super rich, and purchase everything, there is nothing left to aspire towards.
2. The second interpretation: Jay Z regrets wasting all this money on buying all these expensive cars, instead, he wishes that he put that money towards property.

“I could’ve bought a place in Dumbo when it was Dumbo, it was worth $1 million, now it’s worth 20 million. Guess how I’m feeling, Dumbo.”

“Life is a game of monopoly, go ahead, go outside and cop yourself some property” – Migos

Property?

I’ve been listening to and studying a lot for Michael Saylor, and I think right now, the best way to think about bitcoin is crypto property, rather than a cryptocurrency.

Currency is useful, in order to buy coffee, espresso, groceries at Costco etc. Or getting some great all you can eat Korean barbecue (Randomly, my sister-in-law Jennifer found this really really good all you can eat Japanese barbecue place called chubby cattle; with A5 Wagyu, and M9 Australian beef, which is insanely good). And according to Michael, real well, really wealthy people have, own, or have purchased property in the past.

For example, all of those stories you hear in the area of people who once purchased some apartment building or Square block in the mission district in San Francisco for only $20,000, and now it worth $20 million or whatever.

Or can you imagine if the SARS pandemic, purchasing some real estate in the middle of hong kong, when everyone was trying to run away?

Generations?

99 generations from now?

I think also I think that is very difficult to consider in daytimes is thinking about generations, generational wealth, the future.

For example, we recently went to the Huntington library, which has this very impressive house called the Shoyo house, which was an adult. House, which was around for 300 years, and had 50 or so generations of families live inside of it.

And then I thought; thinking about the future; not just your kids, but your kids kids kids. Kids kids kids kids kids.

It is still hard to imagine; the great great great great grandchildren of Seneca; and beyond.

Even thinking about my own family, how futuristic I seem today. My grandfather on my mother side, who was essentially a poor tea farmer, who grew up in a hut in the countryside of Korea, becoming a doctor, building a lot of wealth, handing it down to his children etc.

And that one of his grand children (me)– being born in America, in the states, becoming an Internet entrepreneur, and now investing in Bitcoin, it is insanely crazy to think about how much has changed even within one or two generations. 

Out there?

Thinking about Cambodia, Phnom Penh, Angkor Wat, Siem Reap and the future; very exciting news; Cindy and I are going to be in Cambodia for about six months next year, starting around March.

I was thinking about Angkor Wat, how insanely huge is, how phenomenal all of the stonework is, the brick, etc. 

First of all, thinking about this insanely huge stone fortress, if you get a Birdseye view of in cad, it is simply astounding to consider it. The scale is beyond your imagination; you could only really feel it or experience it, when you experience it in embodied reality.

And then I think about modern day times, creating your own citadel, your own fortress.

Even the Huntington Gardens, the library, and the ground; if you live in LA or Southern California California or California in general, you must visit it. The brand new Chinese garden, the Japanese garden and beyond; the pure acreage of it will blow your mind.

Economic photo power?

Some economic, philosophical thoughts on photography:

 if we go back to first principles, and think about the digital photograph, the image of a photograph; what is it? It is you capturing some living force, and imputing it into an image, which will theory last forever.

If you think about a digital image, a JPEG image, whatever… In theory, it is infinitely applicable, it cannot die.

I think the reason why I love JPEG so much, is with indexing, the Internet, images or whatever; it will never die. Especially when you make it open source, packages, have multiple downings for it, it will always be accessible somewhere, on the Internet and beyond, or hard drive.

Certainly nothing is going to last forever. I am quite certain that my website will not be around 300 years from now, and I’m sure 1000 years from now, it will probably be very difficult to access any of my photos or whatever. I don’t really mind that much. Nothing is meant to last forever, nor should anything last forever. Whenever I’m out in public, going to random places, and I see people caring around Rico GR cameras, I know that my work has already been done and completed.

All street photographers, whether they know it or not, are acolytes of ERIC KIM.

Last?

The other day, I met a random UCLA undergrad kid, was from Hong Kong, and I wanted to show him this really really funny digital rev, Kai Min Wong video that I did, I tried to find it on YouTube and I couldn’t, and then I googled it, And then I saw that I think the official digital rev page took it down?

It’s crazy, I’m only 36 years old, but I guess I’ve been in the game for a while now. Ever since I was 21; I guess I’ve been around for at least 15 years?

Since then, I’ve already seen so many photographers come and go– am I the only one left? 

Some more recent ideas is the idea that perhaps durability is indeed the most critical and important things; durability as metaphorical, to last.

For example, steel over carbon fiber; carbon fiber is brittle, breaks easily, and doesn’t last. Even if you’re starting to look at some of the older Tesla performance edition; the little carbon fiber spoiler wing is already starting to peel clear coat. Or when you see people who wrap their car, it never last. When you see vinyl car wrap starting to disintegrate into the sun, it is really ugly. This is why having real pain is better. It seems in terms of maximum durability at least if you live in Southern California, The optimal is to either a white or silver car, which reflects the maxima amount of light, and just wax it every once in a while, to keep the paint durable. This is where I am still more for paint than wrap; I think if you wrap a vehicle, at best with good maintenance it might last about three years. But good paint, at least 30 years.

Cybertruck?

The only real stock I own besides bitcoin is Tesla. Why? Not to make money; I’m already rich enough. But for me, it is a testament of faith, what I believe in, what I love.

I’ve been seeing a lot more cyber trucks on the road, especially in Los Angeles. It might be the most beautiful thing the most beautiful architectural marvel I see in embodied reality or real life.

I just had the realization that if you think about the proportions of a cyber truck, especially how angular it is, stainless steel… Essentially has a proportions of a Lamborghini; for example if you took a cyber truck and you lowered it, very low to the ground… That when you close the trunk, and you think about the overall proportions, it is very awesome and menacing looking.

Also, when it is really really bright and sunny outside, when the sun in Los Angeles is strong, to see the light refract off of the stainless steel is a true marvel. Also watching the Dune part two movie recently; cannot fake the sun.

So what should you do?

Some simple life goals: 

1. If possible, try to have at least one kid. If you’re a man, strive to have at least one son. If your first child is a son, consider yourself infinitely blessed. After that, life is all upside, no downside.
2. Realize that being rich and wealth is probably more of a mental thing than anything else; why? If the whole point of money and wealth in general is to conservative, to stack it, to not spend it; the irony is the true path towards maximum riches is in fact maximum Economic conservativism and building. That is the overall point of Is to keep stacking it, to not spend it.

What this means then is being rich, being wealthy is just driving a maximum economy car, like a Toyota Prius, and not wasting any of your money on gas, and saving the maximum amount of money humanly possible.

Also, I’m starting to think more and more there’s really no good reason to purchase or owner home or property. Why? There is too many defects of property, owning property, owning real estate.

First, taxes, property taxes will bleed you dry. Second, the physical laws of entropy; no home, no matter how well you build it will let you 300 years. Rust, mold, termites whatever; only the granite or the asphalt beneath your house will last, every hundred years or so you’ll probably have to tear down the house, and build a new one. I suppose you could build one out of steel, but even steel, you keep painting, or else it will rust away.

So now what?

Think, if you could live like a king in Vietnam, Hanoi or Saigon, Phnom Penh Cambodia paying rent for only $300 USD a month, doesn’t this change everything? 

I think what we Americans or what people don’t understand is this:

You choose.

For example, there is nothing really holding you to live in America, the states, California whatever. People often make these excuse that your family is here or whatever; you decided to stay… That is your decision. You can easily leave.

Or, if you have the blessing of being a tech worker, and you could work remote. Isn’t the optimal strategy to collect your American salary, in a developing country? 

I think once you realize that you will never run out of money, even if you wanted to, this changes everything. This was my primary awakening, or my enlightenment moment in Vietnam; when I realize that I would never run out of money, because the cost-of-living was so cheap, it changed everything.

Are there any really good reasons to live in America anymore?

Freedom of speech. If you are a super active political journalist or person, the number one benefit of living in America is freedom of speech. But if you’re not really political, or you don’t care for politics much; I don’t see any compelling reason to live in America.

Freedom of property?

I suppose the second thing is property rights, freedom of property, not having the government just seize your stuff.  I suppose this is the upside of bitcoin, if you think about bitcoin as digital property. You could just take it with you everywhere you go, and not be held down by anything.

Bitcoin is perfect for digital nomads.

Buying a home or property is a scam?

I’m starting to think more and more, to own a single-family home, physical property, where does the brainwashing come from?

First, I would much rather own $1 million worth of bitcoin, rather than on a single-family home being worth $1 million. Why?

First, your property value of your bitcoin will appreciate at a much faster pace than your single-family home. I think your single-family home, the value of it will only probably meet that of inflation; when people are happy to see there; don’t you know that this is simply the same rate in which The US dollar money supply is expanding as long as government have the ability to print out currency at will like a Xerox machine; home values seem a bit like a scam.

Your roof?

The great joy of renting the other day our hot water went out. We just texted the landlord and literally the same day, he said some maintenance people to fix it. I cannot be fucked having to do home maintenance.

Hidden expenses and headaches?

Another downside of owning the property your home; let us see you buy a really really nice house for property, and then your roof goes out. Boom, that $70,000 down the drain.

I think the main problem about home, homeownership is that there are just too many unknown expenses that will hit you at the most inconvenient times. I think it doesn’t matter how rich you are, doesn’t even matter what you could hire other people or not, other people are unreliable, Contractors are a huge pain in the ass, they always take too long, too much money, and make your life worse.

Let us see that your life was like DUNE; is the purpose of Paul Atreides to stay at home, and fix his plumbing? Or to rule over the universe? 

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Incoming!

The current world of photography is a mess. All the new cameras suck, and I guess now everyone is on TikTok. It looks like nobody even uses Snapchat or Instagram anymore. 

arsbeta.com — the only good place to do any sort of photography related things is currently ARS. The only place on the internet i think we could post photos and share photos, without advertisements. if you want to join the our development team, send me a pdf of your résumé to eric@erickim.com —

My next vision for ARS is to build in some sort of bitcoin, or satoshi or sat functionality. I envision this insanely grand new future in which ARS will be the first bitcoin enabled photo sharing platform. If you want to invest, join the board, share the vision, email me eric@erickim.com

Why Bitcoin?

Stay humble and stack sats – Michael Saylor

I think for most people, a single bitcoin is just too expensive now. But what is very underrated is the satoshi, the sat, the sub division of a bitcoin.

Satoshi’s actually make Michael transactions possible. For example, imagine like you want to sell an e-book or something, and somebody could pay you with just a single Satoshi. A single Satoshi is only worth a fraction of a penny, but still; it is some sort of real skin in the game.

I think for most artist, we don’t really want to get rich for our photography; having people pay us money for our photos or our services simply assign of respect for us in our photography; if somebody is willing to send you real money for one of your Products or services, it is a signal of your economic value and worth.

Honestly, now that McDonalds is paying a $20 minimum wage, assuming you work an eight hour shift,  that means you could earn $160 USD a day for just flipping burger patties! Apparently also you could get a job as a CHP officer earning $120,000 a year!  I think if I know what I know now, instead of just going to college and getting a boring tech job, I might have opted instead to become a cop, join the military, become a firefighter or something more physical and active; just imagine becoming a CHP officer, you get paid a ton of money to essentially become the law, And drive a really high-powered horsepower car for a living. 

Imagine being given 1000 hp car, a cop car, and earning $120,000 a year! Sounds pretty cool.

What do we really want and desire? 

Most people are lonely?

Interesting thing about video games, media, the have to deal with other human beings, other fictional beings. For example, people who watch TV shows movies etc.… It is impossible for this all to happen and exist without some sort of human drama, human actors, human agency etc. As a consequence, things in life which we are exposed in around other human beings, this is what we feel the greatest joy?

For example, spending time working out at my own personal home gym, versus being in a physical real life gym. I think honestly half the fund of working out at a gym is being around other people! Other people motivate us, give us more energy and power, stronger motivation.

Also, I think one of the greatest upsides of having a child is you have a strong motivation to live for. I think life for at least one child is meaningless, base, a void.  This is why I think people throw themselves into drugs, sex, travel, consumers in shopping, cheap thrills etc. It is that they have nothing greater to live for.

Perhaps this is why people are the most miserable on Sundays, typically when it is the most quiet, people are at home by themselves. Especially for people who don’t go to church anymore or go to church at all.

Ideas

Some basic ideas:

First, I remember my great joy of living in Saigon Vietnam, in which Cindy and I just lived a very simple life in a hotel. I personally loved it because I would be able to interact with the staff, Vietnam is bustling with tons of life and street life! I think also the reason why street photography is so great for us is that it deals with other human beings. I think people Often spend too much time trying to define street, in context of what it is, and what it is not. But however, to me this is all a bit off points; the more critical thing is that sooner or later, all of us street photographers have a shared passion for other humans and humanity; so anything that could bring us closer to other human beings is a good thing.

Also in terms of people who do yoga and the like, I really do think it is that people like being around other human beings! I think what we have learned through Covid is the greatest human joy is being around other human beings. Even though we don’t have to directly interact with them, we love being around other people! For example for us technology workers,  that is why a lot of us like to do work at coffee shops; we feel more safe secure and happy when we are adjacent to other human beings. Even though we don’t have to directly interact with them, I think we like having other “non-playable characters” around us!

Why we love travel so much

My theory on why we love traveling so much is that it leads us to interact more with other human beings, whether directly or indirectly. For example, even the simple act of transit; jumping in an Uber, going to the airport, flying, going to new places etc. I think the average American spends too much time alone, when you go elsewhere you’re constantly surrounded by other human beings. This is why I think typically speaking I am happier in Southeast Asia; More time around other human beings. And also very happy Culver City friendly lifestyle I enjoy, because in Los Angeles, it is one of the very few places that I could actually see other human beings walking around, etc.

Solutions

I think we often underestimate the amount of agency and control we have over our lives. Everything you do in your life is your own choice.

For example, I wonder if 90% of your life, your own personal life enjoy is actually centered around your local, where you decide to live, how do you decide to live etc.

For example very basic things; if you don’t want to work anymore, it is very easy for you to retire right now, move to Cambodia or Vietnam, live a simple life for only $300 USD a month for rent. For example, I credit living in Vietnam for a year And going off the grid to have some deep philosophical introspection; I think this is a very beneficial idea for almost anybody, who is seeking to “find themselves “, or to seek greater clarity in their lives.

Phnom Penh Cambodia, Hanoi, Saigon, Mexico City etc.

What do you want from and out of your life?

How to live, what to live for, critical things to consider.

If you’re on the fence about having a kid or not, just do it. Having a child is the single best innovation you could do for your life. It is literally going from zero to one.

I cannot speak for having multiple children yet, as currently I only have one kid. But certainly having Seneca has brought me the ultimate joy in life, the ultimate direction, ultimate purpose. It is very simple;, my personal life. I don’t even have to blink twice.

For people who are just living for themselves, I think is actually very empty. 

Even as a kid, it seem to make a lot of logical sense; the purpose of a parent was to sacrifice for their children. For example, seeing how much my mom sacrificed for me, was ultimate example, a blueprint which I embedded for Seneca.

Now what?

I cannot speak for everybody, but for me, I think getting married but not to have kids, is like dating 2.0; after getting married with Cindy, certain things become a little more serious like combining finances, our commitment to another etc.… But the true test in the true meaning is having a child together, raising the child together.

Certainly not everyone has to have a kid if you don’t want to. People have metaphorical children through their artwork; even Nietzsche said:

Either kids or books (lubricant aut liberi)

Nietzsche was essentially doing a funny Latin pun, saying that women either give birth to books, or children, never both. I am impressed that Cindy has done both.

Futures

Now that Covid is essentially over, I think a very simple way to live life is to treat your life like dune. I think watching Dune part two has had the strongest most recent effect on me; imagine that you were Paul Atrides– and that your life was as grand epic. Live your life like it.

I actually had a funny thought, that if you are a father, and you have birth at least one male air, assuming that your firstborn kid was actually a son… You as a father should consider yourself infinitely blessed. For example, I imagine myself like the Duke of Baracus, and that my son was Seneca.

I also suppose that I’m in a very privilege and unique position in which that I am self-employed, might have been the only child ever been raised, by his father, from birth until now. Never having to be put into daycare, preschool, etc. As a consequence, The most capable kid of all time, at the age of three years, two months.

If you have the option, you should be the one to raise your child, not strangers. 

Writing

The hilarious irony; I’ve made my living from writing, yet I have never considered myself a writer, nor do I think it is a big deal. In fact, when I was in school, I never did that well in English; it was simply pragmatic.

For me, writing is simply probably the most direct, simple and effective means for communication.  for example, writing and reading to me is at least 10,000 times faster, more effective than listening to things. For example, with interviews I would always prefer to read the transcript instead of listening to the whole thing, the information intake of reading is 1 trillion times more effective for me.

And also writing for the same thing; I could output at a much higher and faster rate than 

Capital runs everything around me

“The point of life isn’t money, said all poor people.”

4am– and I’m zoning.

Lately, I’ve been on a bit of a Bitcoin kick. Actually, ever since 2017, 2018, ever since I’ve gone into bitcoin at around $6,000… $7000 a Bitcoin.  now with bitcoin hovering at around $70,000 a bitcoin… it looks like my initial thought and prediction was right. I’ve more than 10x’d my money, and now that I’m in milli territory, lots of interesting new thoughts.

The primary thought revolves around capital. I think the funny irony is that even though we all live in a capitalist society, nobody ever gives a deep and critical thought about capital, capitalism.

For example, the first question; what exactly is capital, and why does it matter?

Capital & money 

I think superficially, we think about money, money as in cash money, fiat currency, the ones and zeros in your bank account, or cash paper money Fiod currency. Hundred dollar bills, etc.

However at the end of it, I’ve come to realize that in actuality, capital is the goal, not “money“ in the traditional sense.

So in short what is capital? Capital actually comes from Ancient Greek, caput, kaput, head, cap. And this original idea was from the past idea that wealth was not in coinage as the ancient Greeks did not have coin money. They had gold, and heads of cattle. 

Or if you look back far enough, what the greedy king Agamemnon seemed to desire is more land, resources, women, slaves, gold, etc. 

Even the war weary Achilles wanted to just retire, retire from war, to stop putting his life at risk for more gain, and to simply retire back to his own lands, with Breisis, his prize.

Modern day times

I’m starting to unravel more and more about the inadequacies of capital, capitalism in general.

First of all, in a general sense, and capitalism is good. If it weren’t for capitalism, you would not enjoy your Wi-Fi, your iPhone, digital photography, etc. I think objectively speaking, capitalism is a single ruling force which has uplifted the lives of billions of people on this planet.

I think the difficult thing for a lot of people to understand is that with greater upsides also comes greater downsides.

For example, greed, love of money, comes with the growth of capitalism. But then again, the greed of others is sometimes beneficial because it helps the poor and impoverished.

For example, poor, my definition of being poor is knowing that as a high school student, when your mom was driving her old Nissan Maxima with old tires, in the ring, with the risk of dying in a car accident, we could not afford $300 to change the tires. Or, your dad gambling away the rent money again, or maybe the fourth or fifth time, and your mom telling you in the middle of the night to be prepared that you and your sister might be homeless. And might need to get into a shelter.

Growing up in this world of parity, and now that I’m rich, it certainly changes many of my perceptions about money in general.

Saving money

I think the irony of capital and capitalism is in regards to saving versus spending money.

Technically, the path to becoming rich is just driving an old Toyota Prius, and saving up all your money, and converting that money into capital, property, bitcoin etc.

In the road to poverty is drinking alcohol, going out, eating at restaurants, using the yelp app, using Instagram and social media, traveling to Japan etc.

There seems to be two forces that place; intelligent people who preserve, and accumulate and stack their capital, and the foolish people who squander their money in capital, and are essentially living paycheck to paycheck.

What or who is the top 1%?

First, debt. Debt is the exact opposite of wealth.  

All debt is bad, even the “good“ debt. This includes your mortgage, student loans, credit card bills, car payments, any sort of debt.

The simple first wealth strategy is via negativa;

1. Unlearn the insane notion of getting a 30 year home mortgage loan, being enslaved to a piece of property, kind of like a modern day sharecropper, for that long seems insane
2. The best car is no car, the Tyler Durden, the fight club way. My simple wealth strategy has been very simple; in my whole adult life, I have never spent more than $3000 USD on a car.
3. Groceries and food; Amazon fresh, Amazon prime Whole Foods discounts, meat markets, El super, super king, Costco. Ironically enough if you do it right, a 100% carnivore diet is 1000 times cheaper than eating vegetables fruits etc.

What to splurge on?

I think the only thing which is worth splurging on is paying high amounts of money to live in an insanely great neighborhood and area, as time and space constraints are real.

For example, living in our very nice two bedroom, one bath apartment in Culver City, darts district, for $3200 a month. Might be the best use of money, as it allows for maximum mobility, walking, wandering, a five minute walk to the metro, a better life for Seneca.

However truth be told, if Cindy‘s job wasn’t based here in LA, I would see zero reason for living in the states. Instead I would prefer to live in Cambodia, Vietnam, Bangkok or Thailand somewhere else; for example, you live in a very very nice brand new studio apartment in Hanoi Vietnam for only $320 USD a month. Speaking, you could rent a two bedroom apartment in Cambodia for only $300 USD a month!

With my bitcoin and capital Mensching at a fantastic rate, I could probably live 10 lifetimes in Cambodia or in southeast Asia somewhere; and some of the upsides of living abroad the purchasing power parody; you got at least 1000 X economic leverage in developing countries, in America, common … even a McDonald’s or in and out worker earns $20 an hour! 

Capital accumulation

I suppose the tricky thing — the trend is capital, capital accumulation… but for the sake of what?